


track 8

by largoindminor



Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M, Song Fic (Kinda)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-08
Updated: 2016-07-08
Packaged: 2018-07-22 06:47:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 439
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7424257
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/largoindminor/pseuds/largoindminor





	track 8

It’s not that Sam doesn’t like Metallica, it’s really not. But truth be told, there’s only so many times a man can listen to the same twelve songs in the same damn order before the niggling urge to crush a compact cassette under the heel of his boot settles deep into his bones. So when the Black Album goes missing somewhere between Tulsa and Little Rock in the Summer of ‘06 (it wasn’t him, honest to god it wasn’t), well, Sam’s not overly concerned. 

Months pass. Years. Time measured in miles on the odometer and scars on flesh. The cassette tape (mostly) forgotten, along with a long string of small towns and small victories that blur together in his memory like ink on soggy newsprint. Dean’s steady presence at his side is the only constant in a life defined by its impermanence. They grow together, age and fight and laugh. They break themselves apart with no choice but to stitch themselves back together, and stronger for it. Not perfect, but permanent. Indelible.

Ace of Spades, Back in Black, Physical Graffiti. Coda. Nothing but old cracked plastic and stretched magnetic tape. Dean’s music, but it’s the soundtrack of it all. Their struggles and triumphs. Their lives. 

It’s a radio kind of day because Dean went and did something stupid the night before, not that either of them can remember the details other than Sam’s a little sore over it and Dean’s a little sheepish. It’s top forty and quiet, chosen more for spite and less for Sam’s preferences, but it’s tolerable enough until mile marker one-thirty-two just past Shenandoah when the static kicks in. Sam punches the scan button and let’s it cycle through all the stations twice, planning on a third, when Dean stops it on 106.9 and ups the volume some. 

The cassette’s been gone for years but the guitar intro is as familiar as ever. Track 8, he remembers, surprised how easily it comes back to him. Music’s funny that way, really, just digs a little deeper into the memory than other things. Dean clears his throat with the beat of the drum and adjusts the volume again, bumps the back of Sam’s hand with the back of his when he’s done. Maybe bumps it a few more times here and there over the next five minutes until Sam twines their fingers together.

The song ends. Another one begins. It starts to rain and Dean rubs his thumb absently over Sam’s knuckles to the swish-swish rhythm of the windshield wipers. They drive on to another small town. Hope for another small victory. Together. [Nothing else matters.](http://t.umblr.com/redirect?z=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DNcbAibPA2yY&t=YzBmNDYwZTE3YWRkOWQ4ZTA0MDMwYjdlNmRmYTg0MDkzZjI3MGQ3YyxiRVE0TEU4Ug%3D%3D)


End file.
